BruumRuum!

by David Torrents

Bronze

BruumRuum! is an interactive installation in the public space of Barcelona, beside the DHUB design museum and the AGBAR Tower.The installation interacts with shouts by passers-by near the piece and with ambient noise in the city, changing shape and colour according to the intensity of this noise. In this way, BrumRuum! establishes a dialogue between the visitor and the public space through noise and light, in a square that, like a huge ear, listens and reacts to words. A public space that can hear.BrumRuum! combines colour and sound through 9396 LEDs embedded in a 3,300-square-metre area. People stop, shout, smile, sing, become emotional and hug each other.It is colour because there are lights in constant movement under the feet of the viewer. It is sound because there are sensors in the space that perceive ambient noise and people’s shouts. It is interaction because the light changes, subtly or radically, according to the intensity of the shout. The sensors are at street level and are sensitive to the intensity of noise, capturing louder noises caused by people and traffic passing nearby. But they are also sensitive to softer sounds, which translate into sinuous movements of the lighting system. The installation invites everyone to join in, young and old alike, providing them with an enjoyable moment during their walk. Expanding white colours. Visual sound. The colour of emptiness. Rupture, contrast, disharmony, dissonance, all in the form of lines and pixels. In short, BruumRuum! is a game that fills the night with content, a huge equaliser to gauge the intensity of the sound colours of city life.